A snarky male Deuteragonist who does not work with the law, but who somehow teams up with the cop to solve one or multiple case(s). Unlike the policewoman, he is Street Smart which makes him a powerful and unlikely ally to the cop who need him despite her reluctance to work with this kind of pettycriminal. However, he is often a Jerk with a Heart of Gold and the lawful influence of the cop brings out the best in him, even eventually convincing him to go straight. He does not necessarily need to be a criminal though, good variants include a flamboyant writer or an Intrepid Reporter.

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The reasons that those two people have to work together vary. For the policewoman, he usually is her only witness and/or her last lead. For the guy, it is whether because it affects his business, to be in the good books of the police, to clear his or a friend's name or just because he likes that. Or maybe he just doesn't have the choice. The male sidekick has a much higher than random chance of having a "posh" English accent, and of having his name or job description as the show's title.

The French children series Theo Toutou presents a convoluted subversion: famed author Theo Toutou often helps male Inspector Duraton in his cases but the latter doesn't really ever team up with Theo, often being The Cavalry at the end of the stories. However Theo is teaming up with female catlibrarian Natacha in most of the cases.

In Zootopia, rookie Officer Judy Hopps needs the help of resident con fox Nick Wilde to solve a missing mammal case as he is her only lead. Officer Hopps is an enthusiastic and generally By-the-Book Cop, yet is willing to bend the rules in pursuit of justice. By the end of the film, Nick joins the police force.

Films — Live-Action

The film adaptation of The Da Vinci Code, like the book itself, pairs the female detective Sophie Neveu with cryptologist Robert Langdon. Though Langdon isn't snarky, he is being pursued by police captain Bezu Fache as a prime suspect in the murder of museum curator Jacques Sauniere.

The trope is then played straight in the In Name Only series adaptation Brooklyn Taxi with a completely different cast using the same character archetypes but this time with a female officer named Cat and a male taxi driver named Leo.

Literature

The Da Vinci Code pairs the female detective Sophie Neveu with cryptologist Robert Langdon. Though Langdon isn't snarky, he is being pursued by police captain Bezu Fache as a prime suspect in the murder of museum curator Jacques Sauniere.

In The Dresden Files, Lieutenant Karen Murphy of the Chicago police force often teams up with civilian consultant (and practicing wizard) Harry Dresden in order to solve crimes of a supernatural nature. While Harry's non-stop snark and disrespect for authority and Murphy's frustration and irritation at having to seriously work with someone who calls himself a wizard create friction in the first few books, they do eventually come to respect and care for each other as close friends.

In Death: Detective Eve Dallas's husband Roarke often get involved in her cases, sometimes by coincidence, sometimes by volunteering his help when he thinks she could use it. He is a former street criminal who went legitimate and became a billionaire and the combination of his old talents and his enormous wealth make him very useful to Eve and her squad.

Dempsey and Makepeace: She's a competent but single London cop (who is also titled hereditary aristocracy), he's a cleaned-up Dirty Harry type from the NYPD who gets unexpectedly made her partner for reasons that are never mentioned again after the pilot episode.

A downplayed version in Agent Carter in which Agent Peggy Carter teams up with snarky butler Jarvis. Downplayeed because even though Jarvis was snarky, he was also more skittish and uncomfortable going into danger, while Carter was an outgoing secret agent.

The first season of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. had a Gender Flip version of the trope with stoic and professional agent Grant Ward and snarky hacker Skye who just integrated Coulson's team. Their relationship bloomed throughout the season under each other's influence, with Skye progressively becoming more focused and professional while slowly Defrosting Ward until The Big Damn Kiss. Unfortunately, Ward actually was The Mole though he really felt for her and the betrayal strengthened Skye's convictions to become an agent even more.

Bobbi Morse and Lance Hunter from the same series and the Most WantedSpin-Off also are a version of the trope (the former being an tough undercover agent and the letter a snarky mercenary), but add to that fact that they are a divorced couple in a Love Hate Relationship. By the end of season 2, they are back together and Hunter officially joins S.H.I.E.L.D.

Castle features by-the-book cop Kate Beckett and bestselling mystery novelist Richard Castle. Castle became involved in one of her cases because he was a suspect. He later bribed the mayor to let him tag along on subsequent cases, theoretically for research but in reality because he had a crush on Beckett. See also Nikki Heat in the Literature folder.

Depending on what brain she is "on", iZombie's Olivia Moore can be the snarky civilian to Detective Babineaux in a Gender Inversion of the trope. However, the genders are used straight when Olivia uses her connection with the police to investigate on her own, followed by her friend Ravi who is always snarky (or the non less flamboyant weatherman Johnny Frost in one episode, however he turned out to only be an Helpful Hallucination).

The Mentalist has Patrick Jane, a former stage psychic and con-man, working with California Bureau of Investigation special agent Teresa Lisbon. He has put his bad past behind him, mostly, but he's still a Gadfly who loves messing with people's minds.

Rosewood: Inverted. Snarky and world-weary Detective Annalise Villa of the Miami PD teams up with Dr. Beaumont Rosewood Jr., a private forensic pathologist with a zest for life who tries to convince her to open up and enjoy herself, even as he gets a thrill out of leaving the lab and joining her on cases.

Although Bones is not this trope, the 200th episode special ("The 200th in the 10th") is done in the style of a 1950s big budget crime caper film with Brennan as a new LAPD detective faced with sexism on the force, and Booth as a notorious jewel thief - who is framed for murder. The two team up to clear Booth and catch the real killer.

In Sleepy Hollow, modern day detective Abbie Mills teams up with American Revolution solider Ichabod Crane to fight supernatural monsters plaguing her town. Since Crane is a noble and polite gentleman, most of his snark comes from being a Fish out of Temporal Water both marveled and dismayed by the future.

Disney Heroes: Battle Mode offers some sort of sequel to Zootopia with Judy this time teaming up with Finnick to find an underground fight club (while Nick is on his own stolen ring case with Yax). This might be inspired by the originalscript to Zootopia in which Nick created a fight club for the oppressed predator cast that Judy was trying to find.

Western Animation

Dan and Elise (who is secretly a spy/ninja) have this relationship is some episodes of Dan Vs. in which they find a common enemy, whether it is by pure hatred of it or to protect Chris.

In Transformers: Robots in Disguise, two of the main characters are young cadet Strongarm and speed addict Sideswipe. In the pilot, Strongarm arrested Sideswipe for his dangerous behavior, but then they were both coincidentally dragged along Bumblebee on Earth. A good portion of the first season consists of the two of them bickering but progressively learning from each other.

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